Afghan peace parleys closer than ever before: Haley

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Afghan government wants world powers to ramp up pressure on Pakistan to bring the Taliban to the negotiating table and crack down on militants on its soil, says a US diplomat.

Following her return from a UN Security Council team’s visit to Kabul, Ambassador Nikki Haley said: "They did ask us for consensus to put pressure on Pakistan to change their behaviour."

Haley was among the 15 UNSC envoys, who held talks with President Ashraf Ghani, Chief Executive Dr. Abdullah and other senior Afghan leaders in Kabul at the weekend.

She told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday: "They feel confident that the Taliban will be coming to the table." Kabul urged the Security Council to help bring Pakistan onboard.

Haley claimed the Trump administration’s policy in Afghanistan was working. Negotiations between the government and Taliban and a peace process were closer than ever before, she believed.

The diplomat said: “The US policy on Afghanistan is working. We are seeing that we are closer to talks with the Taliban and the peace process than we’ve seen before…”

She added the team, during the trip, underscored the need for free and fair parliamentary elections in Afghanistan. Participation of all ethnic communities was a must to make the polls inclusive, Haley stressed.

Kairat Umarov, Kazakh ambassador to the UN, said council members were concerned about the intensification of terrorist activities in the north and east of Afghanistan and the regrouping of foreign terrorist coming from Syria and Iraq to Afghanistan.